Ray Saintonge wrote:
When speaking of original research we always need to remember why such a rule arose: to prevent the more loony ideas from having a podium. Articles on current events need to be layered. For some of the of the basic information such as who invaded, and on what date newspaper reports are as reliable as anything. People are anxious to find out more about these things as they happen, and government sources and big news media often leave the impression that they are biased. If we put up early information that is questionable it's easier for us to admit we were wrong and make the necessary corrections than it is for governments and big media.
I agree for current events, but the older something gets, and the more secondary sources become available, the less necessary or wise this becomes, I think. It would be a mistake to cite 1940s newspaper reports even for dates of World War II events, because some of the newspapers may have reported incorrect information---much sounder is to cite a recent book on the subject, which will have read all those newspaper records, compared them to each other and other information, and produced a more reliable summary we can use. For current events we're basically doing that job ourselves, by comparing multiple sources, watching for updates, corrections, and retractions, and so on.
-Mark